Out of the Pocket (7 page)

“Excuse me?”

He looked up and his eyes opened wide. “Oh! Sorry! I thought you were Meg—Mrs. Moran.”

“Sorry,” I said, standing in his doorway.

“Don’t apologize,” he said. “Zid? Zid? Is that a word?”

“Excuse me?”

“A Hebrew coin,” he said, exasperated.

“I really don’t know,” I said. “Dr. Blassingame—”

“This thing will be the death of me.”

“I was hoping I could talk to you,” I continued, my head beginning to pound.

“Zig? Zod? Zed? God! I’m losing it.”

I took a deep breath. “Okay then, probably time for me to go,” I said, turning away.

“No! No! Please. I’m sorry, you just caught me at a funny moment. Please come back and talk to me, Bobby.”

I turned and saw he was smiling at me. The hostility in my chest melted away.

56

“How did you remember my name? There have to be two thousand kids in this school.”

“Yes, but not everyone is Bobby Framingham, fearless leader on the football field,” he said, standing and motioning me in. “I promise, no more crossword puzzle.”

I walked in tentatively and sat in a cushioned chair facing him, my heart beating so loud I could hear it inside my ears. Blassingame was round in the middle, with tattered graying hair and a full beard. His office was decorated with Xerox copies of
Far Side
cartoons and golf memorabilia, including an iron club bent in the middle as if someone had wrapped it around a tree. It hung directly behind him.

“So what brings you to Casa Blassingame?” he asked. “I’m sure we haven’t crossed paths since you were in my class a few years back, correct?”

“Correct,” I said.

He reflexively grabbed for the crossword puzzle in front of him and then looked up at me and pushed it away, sheepishly smiling, his eyes wide. “And to what do I owe this great pleasure?”

I took a deep breath. “I think I’m in trouble,” I said.

He tilted his head at me and raised an eyebrow. “What kind of trouble?”

I laughed, feeling completely out of my comfort zone. “I’m not sure this category of trouble is one you’ve dealt with before.”

He pursed his lips. “Try me.”

“How about this?” I said, slowly blinking and still feeling some heat in my chest left over from the cafeteria. “How about—I’m the quarterback of the football team, a college recruiting prospect, and . . . I’m gay. I told one friend, and now he told two others, and I think my life would pretty much end if it becomes public.” I exhaled wildly.

57

Blassingame didn’t flinch. “I think that’s wonderful,” he said, emphasizing each syllable with enthusiasm.

I opened my mouth and stared at him. “It’s wonderful?”

He laughed gently and smiled at me. “Well yes, isn’t it? Sexuality is a beautiful thing, and we’re all different, and knowing who you are is truly a gift—”

I bolted straight up and stood over his desk. “Are you serious?”

I asked. “This could ruin my life.”

“Oh, I see,” he said, crossing his arms as he looked up at me.

“How?”

“Are you gay?”

Dr. Blassingame looked at me like I was from another planet.

“Now, I must say that in usual circumstances, I’d find that to be an inappropriate question, Bobby. But in this case, I’ll allow it. I am heterosexual. What difference does it make?”

“I’m sorry,” I said, a little embarrassed. “I just don’t think you get the signifi cance of me, as a football player, being gay.”

“Well, surely there are some homosexuals who play professional football.”

“Name one,” I said, slowly pacing his offi ce.

“But that’s preposterous,” he said. “Surely there are some famous gay athletes. Martina Navratilova.”

“Well, there are some women, yeah,” I said.

“There you go,” he said, as if the problem was solved.

“Can you name a single gay male athlete?”

“The diver,” he said, searching for a name.

“Team sports,” I said. “It’s different when it’s a team sport.”

He gawked at me inquisitively.

“You can’t name one, I can’t name one,” I said patiently.

“But it never occurs to me to think of the sexual persuasion of an athlete. Why does it matter?”

58

“Well, maybe it shouldn’t, but it does,” I said. “Otherwise, wouldn’t there be some openly gay people?”

He seemed to be staring through me. “Zuz!” he yelled.

I protected my face with my arms, half expecting a physical attack after what sounded like a war cry.

Blassingame laughed. “I’m sorry Bobby. It was in the back of my mind.
Zuz
. A three-letter word for an ancient Hebrew coin. The doctor triumphs yet again!” He raised his hands in triumph, grabbed his pen, and fi lled in three blank spaces.

Anger was boiling in me, but I looked at him and he seemed so enthralled by this discovery, like a child learning how to read, that I had to laugh. He did, too.

“Forgive me,” he said. “It annoys everyone. I’ll try to do better.”

After a beat he lightly pounded his desk with his fist. “So let me understand,” he said. “You’re angry that your friend betrayed you by telling others.”

“Yes. Exactly,” I said.

“I can imagine that. Friendships are paramount, and there needs to be trust.”

I stared at him, waiting for him to tell me something I didn’t know.

He studied me, as if trying to peer inside me. “Yes, I believe that’s so. Also, you are angry because you are gay and this will make it hard to pursue a career in football.”

“You got it.”

Blassingame stood and wandered to a bookshelf, picking up a book from the second-highest shelf and replacing it on the top shelf.

“I see. Perhaps the answer is to change your sexuality.”

I laughed, thinking about the power of the dreams, the way they’d gotten stronger. I imagined trying to change them and suddenly it seemed ludicrous. “I don’t think I can.”

59

“Ah. So it’s stronger than you are.”

“Well, in some ways it is, I guess.”

He took the same book down and leafed through it. “So you can’t change it.”

“No, I guess not.”

“I see.” He came and sat down again and smiled at me. “Well, Bobby. If you can’t change something, I believe you have two choices.”

“What?” I asked.

“You can accept it, or you can deny it.”

I stared at the busted golf club and thought about this. He had a point. “So I guess I accept it,” I said. “But what if I accept it, but the world doesn’t?”

“I guess all you can do, then, is change the world.”

I laughed. The idea of me, Bobby Framingham, changing the world was pretty stupid. It was hard enough for me to remember to change my underwear.

“Okay then,” I said sarcastically. “I guess I’ll do that.”

He winked at me. “I know you’re not serious, but do me a favor, will you? Keep that in mind. Someone has to change the world. Why not you?”

“I’ll think about that,” I said, wondering if there was anyone out there who actually understood what I was going through.

60

I was adjusting my shoulder pads before Thursdays’ practice when Dennis and Austin came up to me in the locker room.

“Yo, Bobby Lee!” said Austin, clasping my shoulder. Dennis stood silently by his side. Austin called me that because my mother, who was born in the South, sometimes did. It was a term of endearment, and I usually liked it.

I liked it less when used by a double-crossing jerk of a best friend.

“What up?” I replied, focusing on my cleats. There were clumps of dirt in them from the previous day, and I tried poking them out with my fi ngers.

“Dipshit here has something to say to you,” Austin said, and he sort of pushed Dennis at me. Dennis scowled at him.

“Monday in the cafeteria. Way out of line,” he said, by way of apology, his eyes averted.

61

“Yeah,” I said. “Way.” I had avoided Dennis for three days, which isn’t that hard since we don’t hang out that much outside of football. The tough thing was Austin and I had barely talked either.

Just football stuff, nothing personal. I was so mad at him, and Austin knew it. He’d been avoiding me.

“Finch won’t write that shit,” Dennis said. “If you want, I’ll go tell him he better not or I’ll kill him. If that appears in the paper, he’s a dead geek.” Vintage Dennis. An apology by way of promised violence.

I laughed, still not quite over it.

“Probably let’s not do that. Just don’t ever do that to me again, okay? Don’t tell anyone. Please.”

Dennis shrugged. “Not a problem,” he said, relieved, as if everything were back to normal. Things weren’t, but I didn’t have the energy to focus on it. I had to think about practice and the game tomorrow. Dennis strutted off to his locker, and Austin hung around.

He wasn’t in uniform, and wouldn’t be for at least another week.

“Yo, I’m sorry, too, dude,” he said.

“Oh, Dennis was sorry? I didn’t hear him say that,” I said. “Must have missed that in that great apology.”

Austin sat next to me. “What do you expect? It’s Dennis.”

I looked up at him and saw real regret in his eyes.

He really was sorry that he had told Dennis, I could tell.

“So Rahim knows, too,” I said, detaching my mouth guard from my helmet.

Austin examined his feet and said, “Yeah.”

I walked toward the water fountain and Austin walked at my side.

“Anyone else?”

He shook his head.

I pressed the button, placed my mouth guard under the 62

stream of water, and looked up at him. I tried to say it as nicely as possible because I didn’t want to fight. “Why’d you do that, Austin?

I trusted you.”

Austin exhaled. “I didn’t mean to do something bad. I just needed to tell someone. I should never have told Dennis. That was stupid. I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, that wasn’t so smart,” I said, waving my mouth guard in the air to dry it. “Well, it’s done, anyways.”

“Yeah. Done,” Austin said. “And I’m sorry, dude.”

“How are you feeling, how are you feeling?” I said, mimicking him making fun of me. He got it immediately and laughed.

I was glad it ended with a laugh, and felt a little bit lighter on my feet after I punched him in the shoulder and slowly jogged out to the fi eld.

We started practice with the scrambling triangular, an agility drill. As a lefty, I dropped back, keeping the ball up near my left shoulder as if I was about to pass. I dropped back five steps, and then ran to my left at a forty-five-degree angle, as if being forced out of the pocket. I then shuffled quickly to the left and ran backward, back to where I began, and threw the ball off to my right. It’s supposed to help your agility when the pocket breaks down.

Sometimes the pocket breaks down and you’d better be ready to
scramble. Your feet are all you can one hundred percent depend on.

I was ultrafocused and Coach saw my intensity.

“Attaboy, Bobby,” he yelled, and I felt hot, in my stomach. I like praise, especially from Coach, who can be tough.

We did formation work and I tried to keep my chin up, but the tier brought out the worst in me, as always.

The tier formation was this big, ugly, unwanted thing that was ruining my life, and I had no control over it, just had to deal with it the best I could.

63

I couldn’t get the timing down, especially when I was throwing to Somers out of the backfield. Sometimes it meant an extra few seconds in the pocket, and it was hard to stay patient.

“Yo, Bobby, stop your dancing,” yelled Rahim, after one play in which I had shimmied around the pocket for much longer than was comfortable. “You suck at it.” Everyone laughed, so I did, too.

Since it was Thursday, we did our typical run-through, focusing on our opponent for the next day, La Habra. Big defensive line, Coach kept warning. We had to be aware that there wouldn’t be much time to pass.

I was pretty sharp, surprising myself. On a quick five-step drop, I hit Rahim on a post pattern with a total rocket. I felt alive, powerful out there. It was the type of pass I threw once in a while that reminded me I could really do this. A few plays later I got Dennis to bite on a pump fake when we went starting offense against scout defense, no tackling. Dennis was a second stringer, which was one of those things we did not talk about. He was covering Somers, down the left sideline, and Somers did a hook-and-go, meaning he stopped short as if I were throwing to him. I sold it real well, and Dennis flew out toward the sideline, thinking the ball would be there. Somers darted past him and I hit him farther down the sideline.

Pretty slick, and it felt great.

Walking back to the locker room after practice, I caught up with Rahim.

“I know you know,” I said.

“Good,” Rahim said. “I’m glad you told someone.”

I started in on why I told Austin and not him, and he shut me up.

“I’m fi ne, B. You don’t need to worry about that,” he said.

Then he smiled. “I’m good with you being gay. My uncle is and he’s cool. God loves everyone the same.”

64

I took that information in. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad.

“Thanks,” I said.

The showers were boisterous, more than usual. Lots of hollering and talking about naked girls. Not my favorite thing, but I could deal with it. I usually just listened and laughed once in a while.

“Hey, moron, eyes up here,” bellowed Torry Hodges, one of our offensive linemen. I froze, because I knew I could not deal with it today. We’d had a good practice, I’d had a decent day, and all I wanted to do was go home. Then I realized that the comment wasn’t aimed at me. He was yelling toward one of the sophomore guys who doesn’t play much, a guy named Hector Jimenez.

“Fuck you, I ain’t no faggot,” Hector yelled back.

“Then why is my ass all hot?” countered Torry.

“Beats me, faggot,” said Hector, and everyone laughed. It was pretty ballsy of him to say that to Torry, who was a senior and about twice as big as Hector. Torry bolted over to where Hector was showering and put him in a headlock.

“What’d you say? What’d you say, boy? Fag boy?” Hector tried to squirm out of Torry’s grasp, but couldn’t.

This is the stuff that kills me. That straight guys will actually go
over to a naked guy and put him in a headlock, no questions asked,
but you make a mistake and forget to avert your eyes from their body,
and suddenly you’re queer.